Ink It!
Ink It! Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Components
- 300 Word cards
- 5 Round cards
- 4 stamps: Circle, Square, Triangle, Rectangle
- 4 ink pads: Red, Blue, Green, Yellow
- A pad of sheets
Setup
These rules are intended for your first game. After that, add the rules as mentioned in the After your first game section.
- Put all 4 stamps on top of their pads in the center of the table. Besides them, place all 5 Round cards, stacked in a descending order (the "5" card should be on top of the stack, and the "1" card, on the bottom).
- Shuffle the Word cards and place them in the center of the table as a facedown deck.
- Choose a player who will be the Captain for the first round.
Game Round
A game round is played in two steps: a drawing step and the discovery step.
Drawing Step
The captain deals every player but themselves a face-down Word card and a sheet from the pad. Each player may look at their dealt card but cannot show it to other players (with 3 players and less, players must draw more than one word! See "How Many Players?").
Players try to represent what's on their Word card. To do so, they can only use the ink pads and stamps! The number of "stamp strokes" per drawing is limited: each player can only use as many stamps as shown on the Round card (five for the first round, four for the second round, and so on). Players may use less stamp strokes than shown on the current Round card.
Important: the circle must always stay red, the triangle must always stay green, the square, blue, and the rectangle, yellow! Do not change the ink pads of the stamps!
The players who draw may:
- Use the same stamp multiple times.
- Stamp over a part of another shape.
- Stamp partially or out of the frame (mind the table, however!).
- Use their sheet in portrait mode or landscape mode.
The players cannot:
- Use the stamp as a pen, stretching the shape.
- Use another color for a shape. Each shape matches one ink pad.
- Spell letters of the Word card (for instance, letter A for "Angel").
Players create their concept, all at the same time and without communicating on what they are drawing. This means that after using a stamp, you must place it back in the center of the table!
When a player has finished their drawing, they place it, face up, in front of the captain and so that the captain has the best view of it (the captain will have to interpret the drawing, after all). Once all players have given their drawing to the captain, proceed to the discovery step.
Discovery Step
All players give their Word card to the captain, face down. The captain shuffles them and reveals them one after another, reading their content aloud.
The captain then must find out which Word card goes with which drawing. The other players cannot help the captain or influence them. The captain matches drawings and Word cards by placing a Word card besides the drawing they think match.
Once the captain has placed one card in front of each drawing, players drum roll on the table for suspense. After three seconds of suspense, they lift their arms if the captain has successfully guessed their matching picture and word, or leave their hands on the table to show the captain has made a mistake. The players can then say which word card matches which drawing. Place wrong Word cards besides the Round cards to show the mistakes, and place the other ones back into the box.
Note: if the captain has swapped 2 Word cards of 2 drawings, this counts as two mistakes!
End of a Round
Once the round is over, put the top card of the Round deck back into the box. If that deck is now empty, congratulations, the game is over and you won!
Else, the player on the left of the captain becomes the new captain. A new round can now begin!
End of the Game
The game immediately ends if players have made too many mistakes: there can be a maximum of one mistake per player (for example, if you play with 5 players, up to 5 errors). If you reach or exceed that number of mistakes, then you lose the game together. Next time, you'll all have to be better at interpreting the drawings of the others, and better at communicating your concepts!
If the game has not ended prematurely, it ends when you remove the last Round card. The players then all win together! To have the best victory, you must make as few mistakes as possible.
How Many Players?
3 players and less
Whenever you play with 3 players or less, each player makes more drawings and receives more Word cards! Moreover, we strongly recommend using odd ones out even in the first game if you play with 3 or less players.
- 3 players: 2 Word cards and drawings per player who draws.
- 2 players: 3 Word cards and drawings for the player who draws.
When you drum roll for suspense, players who have drawn only lift their arms when the captain has guessed all their drawings correctly!
8 players (and more!)
Whenever you play with 8 players and more, there are multiple captains! Captains can discuss what association to make, where are the odd ones out, once they have received all the Word cards from the players.
- 8 and 9 players: play with 2 captains.
- 10 players: play with 3 captains.
If you want to play with more than 10 players, play with 1 extra captain for each player above 10!
After Your First Game
Once the first game has been played, use this extra rule: each round, add two odd ones out!
The captain draws two Word cards at the beginning of the Discovery step and shuffles them, without looking at them, to all the cards the players hand out! There will always be 2 cards that match no drawing!
The captain must find the matching drawings, avoiding odd ones out. Matching an odd one out to a drawing is always a mistake.
At the end of the round, all extra cards are put back into the box.
Note: odd ones out can increase difficulty for games with 6 players or more. If you find the game too hard for you, feel free to use only one odd one out instead of two.
You can keep the drawings you're the most proud of! You may even have people who haven't played the game guess what they are. We recommend you to reuse the sheets you have no use for, for instance as a grocery list. And if you discard them, please recycle them! Finally, if you reach the end of the pad, simply cut white paper sheets to refill the game!